Blind Faith
by Dianne
Summary: Pre-series - episode entitled 'Rip off' - There was no point denying it; John's life as a firefighter had to be fleeting. The anthropologists had foretold of his failure. And how would Roy tells his wife and kids that he was going to jail for victim theft
1. Chapter 1

Author's notes: This story is sort of a tag for the episode 'Rip Off' where Gage and Desoto are accused of stealing five hundred dollars (a lot of money in the '70's) from a heart attack victim. The episode 'Peace Pipe' also figures in, which highlighted some racial tensions at Station fifty-one early on and touched upon Johnny's childhood and some anthropologists (Marcus Parkham) who according to the character 'made my life a living hell'. The story begins in the pre-series years and leads to around the Rip Off episode. I don't adhere to strict timelines where episodes are concerned; I bend them for story purposes, which I guess is the point of fanfiction. This is the first story I've put up in a long time owing to being very busy. In the spirit of getting the story up for Valentine's Day, I went over it for mistakes as well as time permitted. The story is two chapters in length, the second one fairly long, so feel free to break it up and read as you wish or read it all at once. Also, I've never been to the Natural History Museum so if you have, you'll have to just ignore any descriptions I make that differ from your memory of it.

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Stealing wasn't right. He'd been taught that by his parents. He believed that. But then Justice had turned her blind eyes and stolen something from _him_ he would never get back. Since then he'd been alone. Since then he'd had to be brave.

But right now? Seven year old John Gage didn't feel so brave. Sneaking out of his Aunt's house before dawn and making his way to the Natural History Museum in his new hometown of L.A. had been a bit exhilarating; slipping in to the heavily guarded building with the cleaning staff in a huge bucket in the morning, a stroke of genius; staring into the face of a humongous dinosaur that looked vividly alive as the sunrise stroked its gaunt, hollow cheeks through ceiling high windows, horrifying. He tried not to think of the huge, oppressive figures as he silently made his way toward his target, the vaulted ceilings echoing even his quietest footsteps.

John stood before a glass framed essay that hung on the outside of the Native American exhibit room at the Natural History Museum in L.A. The hated name of Marcus Parkham stood out black against the white paper in the faint night auxiliary lighting. John looked around. No one was about but even on tip-toes he could not reach the lies that stared down at him. Ever resourceful John grabbed a reproduction spear that looked identical to the ones behind the thick glass display cases. The weight felt good in his small hands, gave him a sense of purpose, might even kill the dinosaur if it came alive and decided to come eat him. He swung the spear with all his might toward the frame, picturing Marcus Parkham's face. All of the built up hurt and frustration that this man had placed on their reservation bubbled to the surface and exploded from one little boy.

"THEY." Whack! "DID NOT." Whack! "DRINK TOO MUCH." Whack! "WE." Whack! "ARE NOT S-SAVAGES!" Whack!

John crouched before the frame prying the paper from the glass shards. Somehow it wasn't as satisfying as he'd pictured this moment. His parents didn't suddenly appear as proud ghosts telling him he'd done well like what happened in the movies, there was no applause or praise. He stifled a cry as a corner broke free and bit into his palm as he pulled the last of the paper free and that was when he was sure he was finally all alone in the world.

He couldn't read all the words on the long essay but Parkham's name at the heading and his own last name and some of those from the reservation scattered here and there were plain enough. All he knew was that his parents had been going to a meeting at the community center to meet with tribal elders regarding this very document when they'd been killed in a traffic accident. Something in that document had upset the whole community and had changed everything on the small Montana reservation that summer. And it had ripped a small boy out of the only home he'd ever known.

John looked around frantically as shouts were heard and footsteps headed in his direction.

"He's in there!"

Somehow the pounding steps of dinosaurs coming to devour him whole would have sounded better about now.

John slipped on broken glass but gained traction just as a security guard reached for him. He felt a few hairs rip from the top of his head as the guy narrowly missed a full grab. He sped from the room, the guard stopping to turn the frame over to check what had been smashed as he reached for his walkie talkie to give a location on the little thief.

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Fifteen year old Roy Desoto could care less that according to his teacher, history was about to come alive before their eyes. What teacher in their right mind scheduled a trip to the Natural History Museum on Valentine's Day? Right now back at school kids were dancing, sneaking out of the gym to find a spot to neck and hold hands. And here he was standing behind a velvet rope that blocked he and his fellow classmates from a display of a massive tepee behind which people in Native American costumes prepared for a presentation of some kind.

Roy's eyes fixed on a slim, dark haired girl who stood out from the semicircle of students looking keenly interested in what was about to happen. Her pencil was poised over the already half-filled lined paper on her clipboard. Roy looked down at his own clipboard and hurriedly erased the heart and initials he'd managed to doodle without even knowing it. He glanced nervously over his shoulder, making sure no one had seen his scribbling. He blew the eraser scraps onto the floor. Joanne chose this time to look in his direction, shaking her head in disapproval as the rubber marred the otherwise spotless marble flooring. Roy dumbly tried to squash it from view with his running shoe which only made things worse as lines of rubber clumps streaked the floor. He looked down to see his own guilty expression through the debris.

The presentation began with faint cries of pain from a woman from within the tepee. An older woman whom the narrator called a medicine woman entered the tent. The young boys in the crowd blushed and the girls leaned forward with anticipation as a 'newborn baby' wrapped in soft leather was carried from the tepee and presented to the tribe. The actor then brought the infant, who it turned out was not a doll but a real, honest to goodness baby actor around for the enchanted crowd to see. Roy watched as Joanne cooed at the little baby and timidly reached out to touch his tiny hand. The rest of the presentation was pretty much a blur as that image of Joanne stuck in Roy's head while the dancing of the actors celebrating the child's birth and his growth to manhood ensued. Roy failed to clap at the end of the presentation as the actors bowed and took off their feathered headdresses and began preparing for the next presentation.

Something smacked lightly into the back of Roy's head. A small boy who could have been one of the actors from the presentation stood behind him on a bench.

"That was rude, you know?" the tanned, dark haired boy of about seven told Roy as he kept glancing fervently over his shoulder.

"Wha-? Oh! I didn't mean to not …" Roy stammered.

The boy followed the teen's gaze to the girl who was scribbling furiously on her paper now.

"Oh brother!" said the little boy slapping his hand to his forehead and then looking at Roy's empty clipboard, the faded RD loves JP still visible. "You don't wanna get tangled up with girls. You'll fail. Trust me, they're nothin' but trouble."

Roy turned his attention to the child realizing he could not have been part of the show because he was wearing Levi jeans just like his only in miniature. Roy glanced around for the boy's parents.

A lively drum beat started and the young boy's head snapped up. Even standing on the bench, he was scarcely able to see over the much taller teens from Roy's class.

A burly security guard carrying a broken picture frame with jangling glass shards clattering noisily stared around the crowd parting people gathered to watch the show like the Red Sea. He reached the other end of the room and exited. Roy thought he heard an audible sigh of relief as he turned around to look at the kid behind him who was in mid leap from the bench when his foot caught in the slats. Dark brown eyes opened wide in surprise. Roy dropped his clipboard and spun around catching the small child even as he lost balance himself and fell. The child landed face-up with a soft thump on Roy's chest narrowly avoiding smacking his head on a totem pole that was part of a interactive display. Both boys looked up to the symbol of an otter, the sign beside that part of the totem read 'trusting, inquisitive and bright, loyal friendship'.

The little boy rolled from Roy's chest as the object of the teen's affections came running over.

"Are you two alright?" she anxiously inquired.

Roy was sure he'd heard the boy utter a small cry of pain but by now he was up and halfway down the marble archway leading from this exhibit room with a small limp.

"I'm okay," Roy blushed, staring after the kid, still wondering where his parents were.

Shhhh!" came the stern warning from Joanne and Roy's teacher. By now, half the class was staring at them and Roy realized Joanne had dropped her clipboard to run to him as well.

Roy turned his attention somewhat back to his studies but it was hard with Joanne standing directly beside him, almost touching him. An older woman hurried through the exhibit room with apologies muttering about an errant child. Roy felt somewhat better knowing someone was at least looking for the child.

Lunchtime finally arrived and the teacher dismissed the class to either go to the museum's small café or to eat their bag lunch on the grounds. The room cleared leaving just Joanne and Roy.

"That was really something the way you just dove under that kid. He'd have hit his head for sure," Jo said admiringly.

"It was nothin'," Roy replied trying to sound brave and noble.

They'd known each other since grade five. Jo looked at the boy from down the street. When did he get that tall? Had his eyes always been blue?

"Well, I thought it was very brave," Jo gushed. She stood on tip-toe and gave him a small kiss on the cheek. Roy's blue eyes widened.

"Well, he's just a little guy …" Roy began, wanting to brag a bit to see if he'd get another kiss but then his resolve cracked. "Urgh!" he muttered in what he hoped was under his breath but wasn't. "I think he was hurt a bit. He was limping. Maybe we should go looking for him and make sure his parents found him."

Expecting Joanne to be insulted that his thoughts ran away from her to the little boy, Roy squinted down at the girl who stood so close to him he could smell her apple shampoo.

"You are the sweetest boy!" Jo said, misty eyes fixed on the blushing teen. Let's go look for him. It's lunchtime, he's probably hungry if he wandered away from his parents before he ate. We can take him to lost and found and have them paged."

For the next half hour Roy and Joanne searched for the boy, finding it odd that there hadn't been an announcement on the public address system regarding a lost child. Roy got a funny feeling when he saw a uniformed police officer patrolling the exit in the main lobby.

Most of the exhibits were deserted for lunch, the teen's running shoes squeaking on the marble the only sound in the cavernous halls before they reached an information desk off the main hall.

"When I got up at six' o'clock for work, I found a pamphlet from this museum, that's how I knew where he'd gone," came a very distraught female voice.

Joanne and Roy peaked from behind a reproduction of an Easter Island Head as the woman continued to give a statement to a security guard in a blue uniform who spoke into a walkie talkie.

"He's been a bit troubled since I moved him here from Montana. He's been begging me to bring him here to the museum but I haven't had time. I had to take off time from work to pick him up in Montana and…"

"I'm sorry ma'am I don't need those details; just what he looks like and where you think he may be headed," the guard said, tapping his pen on the shattered picture frame that Roy could now make out on the desk in front of him.

The woman composed herself and proceeded to describe the little boy Roy had caught right down to his Levi's and running shoes and his big brown eyes but she couldn't stop herself from going on even though the security guard had finished writing out his description.

"He wasn't … doing well in Montana. I can't imagine he'd run away to go back there, I mean he loved Montana obviously when his parents were alive but I just thought…"

"You'll have to pay for this frame, ma'am when we find him and count the boy lucky that the document in it wasn't ancient," said the unhelpful guard who seemed more perturbed about the broken frame than a lost little boy. "Oh, and did you want to pay admission for him and yourself now or when we catch … find him?"

Roy's blood boiled. The woman was obviously distraught about the young child and worried that he'd fled the museum and here the guard cared only about admission and paying for the frame.

"Shh! I think I hear something," Roy said, putting his hand up. Joanne hadn't heard anything.

"I think you must have some sort of rescue dog hearing," Jo whispered as she followed Roy from one room to another toward a display of mountain goats. Unless the stuffed animals were equipped with speakers and were sniffling miserably, there was indeed someone making that sound and it was coming from behind a particularly large mountain goat.

The thin, tanned little boy from the tepee exhibit sat clutching his ankle and sniffling quietly into his hand which was pressed over his mouth.

"Hey, little guy, whatcha' doin' here?" Roy asked, plopping himself down on the soft, fake snow behind a very large mountain goat.

"Only been here a week an' I've-I've already screwed it up," the boy said hopelessly.

"Oh, I'm sure it's not that bad," Roy soothed as Jo nodded at him in approval of the way he was handling things.

"Oh yeah? Well th-these are new," the boy said desperately holding up his small foot.

Roy reached for the ankle immediately. It was swollen and a thick trickle of blood flowed over the torn canvas of the shoe.

"Wished you'd saved the shoe instead 'o my head," the boy sniffled. He took the shoe off and bit back a gasp of pain. He made to get up but Roy pushed gently on his chest to hold him down in his seated position.

"Whoa take it easy. It's just a pair of runners. Let me see your ankle," Roy ordered holding his palm out. The small foot plopped into his hand and the boy leaned back with his arm over his head resignedly.

"It's busted," the boy said with certainty.

"I think it is," Roy mouthed to Joanne looking sort of desperate and wondering how the kid would know that and not be screaming in pain instead of the controlled whimpers he allowed out from time to time. Roy thought back to the crack he'd heard when he'd caught the kid and the shudder that chorused through him before he scrambled up and ran away.

Roy peeled the wet blue sock off the tiny foot, patterns of cotton marring the skin from its tightness from the swelling. A small amount of blood from a star shaped cut no doubt from a screw on the wooden bench pulsed out from the left side of his ankle but no bone stuck through. Roy took a deep breath and steeled himself as he applied a bit of pressure to the wound. The boy flinched but didn't say a word. Joanne slipped from the room to find the lady and the security guard. Roy hoped they hadn't gotten far. A little trickle of blood seeped from between his fingers and he felt slightly sick.

"M-my aunt's gonna kill me," the little boy said quietly.

"You mean the shorter, older woman with the hairdo that looks sorta like a cauliflower?" Roy said kindly, smiling a bit at the boy who peaked from between his fingers.

"She knew I came here?" the boy said incredulously.

"You mean you didn't come here _with_ her?"

"N-no, I sorta snuck out. She must have followed me," he said in wonder.

"And why would she do that?" Roy encouraged as the pulse in the boy's ankle beat just a little slower and his face turned a slight green shade.

"M-maybe she does really want me?"

"That's the way I heard it when she was telling the security guard how worried she was about you," Roy told the little boy.

At the mention of the security guard the boy paled impossibly further.

"I'm probably going to jail," the little boy whispered frantically trying to get up again. "Mr. Parkham told me a-all kids like me grow up and go to jail; that it's just somethin' inside us…"

"They don't put little kids in jail," Roy reassured him. "Besides, why would you be going to jail? Sneaking out isn't a criminal offense, maybe a grounding one …" he trailed off smiling and trying to get the boy to calm down.

"No, you don't under-understand," the boy told him growing impossibly paler. His small fist uncurled to reveal a crumpled piece of paper. "I can't get caught with this! I didn't mean to be bad but this … it's all lies I swear."

"Your hand's bleeding," Roy gasped.

Whatever was in that small hand, it was obviously worth his blood to steal. Dark pools of brown met blue ones imploringly. The ankle was wrenched from Roy's grasp in a show of strength Roy wouldn't have thought possible for such a small, wounded kid. Roy tackled him back down onto the soft, fake snow where he laid panting, tears betraying him and making him look even younger.

"I – I – I promise it isn't worth anything. It isn't even old. It's just really bad. I can't get caught with it. Please?"

But Roy held the squirming boy firmly even as his resolve crumbled. He had no idea why he trusted the kid but there was something about him.

"Stay put!" Roy warned firmly, leaning down next to the kid's right ear. I'll be right back but if you move I'll tell them where it is."

Roy didn't want to leave the kid who was panting in pain and gratitude but he took the crumpled, slightly bloody paper and ran flat out of the room looking both ways until he spotted a ladies room. He knocked loudly.

"Housekeeping," he called dumbly. No one answered so he slipped inside and found a cubicle. He tossed the crumpled paper into a toilet and flushed. Making sure it went down he opened the door to the bathroom quietly and peaked out. He made it back to the child behind the mountain goats quickly, rather astonished to find him still there.

"Wh – what did you do with it?" pleaded the boy.

"Let's just say I put it in the circular file, which by the sounds of things is where it belongs," Roy replied not believing he was taking a stranger's words on such faith.

Relief flooded the pale cheeks. Dark lashes closed over pain-filled eyes. "They sent me a f – friend," the little boy smiled quietly. "It'll be o – okay now."

Joanne returned followed by the lady with the cauliflower hair.

"Oh, Johnny!" gasped the woman Roy could only assume was the little boy's aunt.

Johnny's lashes fluttered open as Roy once again took his small ankle into his hands.

"I'm – I'm sorry Aunt Rose," John gulped.

Aunt Rose knelt next to her nephew, her arms slipping around his torso. She brushed his sweat soaked bangs back lovingly.

"What on earth happened to you?" she whispered to both John and Roy and then to Joanne. Roy shook his head not knowing what to say. He was nervous, wondering if cameras had followed his actions as he'd for some reason listened to a seven year old stranger and flushed what for all he really knew could have been a priceless artifact without even looking at it. He suddenly felt rather sick but somehow exhilarated at the same time, which was the exact look on the little boy's face, albeit mingled with pain. Roy could never be sure of course but he felt like this might be an expression the boy wore a lot.

John sat up with a grunt of effort even as Roy tried to stop him. Roy held firmly to the little foot and looked as the mischievous minor peaked around for security.

"I – took it, Aunt R-Rose," he stammered, his eyes watering again. Roy wondered if the stammering was a habit he did only out of nerves or if it was a permanent thing.

"Oh, John," Aunt Rose gasped in anxiety. "I told you, Marcus Parkham's papers are published all over the country. You can't get rid of them by …" She trailed off and looked squarely at Roy who swore she could see right through him. "All you can do is tell as many people as you can our version of things; set things right with the truth. Show people that he's wrong. Go to school, get a good education, have some fun, it's okay, you know, they'd want you to be happy."

Something cleared in the child's eyes even as pain overtook his control. His jaw jumped as he looked at his rescuer. Roy cleared his throat uncomfortably as the brown orbs bored into him.

"Th – thanks for catching me," Johnny told Roy sincerely. "And for … you know."

"Don't know what you're talkin' about, kid," Roy smiled, winking slightly at Johnny.

"There you are, you little sav…" the security guard stammered as one of the docents from the Native American Display room entered. She was followed by a young, black policeman. She turned to the security guard, berating him for his intended racial slur toward the boy.

Officer Vince Howard knelt down next to Johnny. He took one look at the ankle held in Roy's hand and called for an ambulance.

Johnny held up his small, clasped hands and closed his eyes. "It's – it's okay to take me to jail now. Not everybody believes him. He doesn't believe him. You can cuff me now." And then he passed out.

Roy watched Vince Howard curiously as John's hands fell back to his chest. As the ambulance attendants covered the small form in a blanket and prepared to lift him onto a gurney, the small foot was taken from him and wrapped in gauze. Roy was glad the child was no longer awake. Black and blue bruising was making itself known around the deep, star shaped wound and there was no one to do anything about the pain.

"I'll meet you at the hospital ma'am," Officer Howard told Aunt Rose kindly.

"Let's get you cleaned up, young man," the officer told Roy. Roy had been crouched over the little boy for so long his legs ached. He stretched and followed the officer into the men's room. Vince handed the boy a new cake of soap and a huge wad of paper towels.

"So you wanna tell me what happened back there?" the officer asked calmly as Roy twisted a piece of paper toweling tightly so it formed a point with which he could clean the blood from under his nails.

"I uh, don't know the kid," Roy answered truthfully. "He was watching the show in the Native American Display room one minute and the next he was falling from a bench. I caught him and he took off. I uh, guess I was worried he was hurt and me and…" It was just then that Roy remembered that Joanne had been with him for most of the ordeal. He groaned inwardly. He'd followed the officer away without so much as a backwards glance at Joanne, the love of his life, well for the last five years and counting anyway. And he'd blown it.

"Oh no, my teacher's gonna kill me!" Roy realized, looking at the clock at the far end of the men's room.

There was tiny knock on the door. Vince Howard gestured for Roy to continue cleaning his hands. A young girl stood outside the men's room.

"Um, if Roy's done, our teacher needs us back. Our bus is leaving shortly," she told Officer Howard timidly.

"Please tell your teacher that you'll be driven back to your school by L.A.P.D.," Officer Howard informed Joanne.

Joanne found her teacher waiting by the school bus out front of the museum just as little Johnny was being loaded into the ambulance. Johnny spotted her and she slipped her hand under the blanket to hold his hand for a minute.

"Girls aren't yucky," the seven year old said, completely astonished. "You're actually kinda incredible! Wait a minute." He squirmed to get his hand to his jeans pocket beneath the straps holding him down. He slipped a paper into her hand just as the ambulance attendants pushed the gurney inside the ambulance and closed the doors.

Joanne opened the folded paper and her mouth dropped open into a small 'oh'. The very faded RD loves JP drawn inside a heart lingered on the otherwise blank slate.

"I th-think he didn't want you to see this," the little boy winked.

Joanne listened to the wail of the sirens as the ambulance pulled away with Aunt Rose in the front seat and the mysterious boy in the back. Her teacher wasn't pleased with the turn of events, telling her that she and Roy should have done what they were told and gone to lunch in the café or out of doors on the grounds. Normally, Joanne would have agreed but inside she felt a pride she couldn't explain even to herself for once in her life having broken the rules. She made her way gloomily back to the men's room to find Roy being led toward the cafeteria by the officer. She fell in step behind them.

Vince bought the two teenagers a sandwich and chocolate milk. For reasons Roy couldn't explain, he did not tell the officer about the paper the young boy had been clutching in his hand and what had become of it. Sure, he knew he'd be in trouble for flushing it but it wasn't self preservation at all. The conviction the little boy had about that paper and its inherent evil was enough to convince him that he'd take whatever secret the boy had about it to the grave. And speaking of secrets, Roy gasped as Joanne looked at his clipboard. He gulped audibly, relieved. He must have done a better job of erasing his lovesick doodling than he'd thought… Whew!

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Years passed and Roy's memory of the boy faded only slightly. He would always be a Peter Pan sort of child, his shadow remaining behind long after he was gone. Roy often wondered what became of him as his life changed from a stint in the navy to joining the Los Angeles Fire Department and marrying the love of his life, Joanne.

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John spent his teenage years trying to believe in the inherent goodness in most people. It wasn't easy but thinking back to the boy who had saved him in the museum made it easier. He often wondered what became of him. He took his aunt's advice. He was editor of his high school newspaper, he was a track star, and he joined the Los Angeles Fire Department and became a paramedic.

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Joanne stared at her tenth anniversary ring. Ten was really just a number. She'd known Roy since grade five but it was a little boy who literally fell into their life who'd made her really see Roy for the first time when they were in tenth grade. As she looked at her own seven year old she wondered what became of the seven year old who'd declared her 'incredible!' all those years ago.

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A/N: Otters are seen by many native cultures as totem animals and are 'trustworthy, inquisitive, loyal friends. They are in the same family as the badger whom some of you may recall is the symbol of Hufflepuff House in the J.K. Rowling Harry Potter series. It seemed fitting therefore that since John's culture in the show is native that we touch upon that lovely trait and expand on it and fate's role in the friendship between Roy and John.


	2. Chapter 2

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Author's Note: There is an episode that indicates that anthropologists from the reservation from John's childhood tried to contact him at the station. In this episode John is angry and rather hurt at the implication that it is an anomaly that he's made something of himself. In 'Peace Pipe', the character indicates that these 'anthros' made his life a living hell. For this reason, I felt it wasn't a leap to the conclude that being questioned for a crime he did not commit would hurt and that coupled with the 'anthros' and ruthless police questioning would unnerve him. Roy suffered immensely in the Rip Off episode too. So … I took a bit of creative license and this is what happened.

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John Gage swallowed the lump in his throat as he walked around station fifty one as if he was merely on a tour of the neighborhood fire station. He felt more disconnected than he'd ever thought possible as if it really was all too good to be true. His uniform felt too tight, his boots too big to fill. He'd never really filled them anyway, they were fireman's boots. He knew it couldn't last.

Roy sat with his head in his hands, once in awhile scrubbing his hand over his face.

"I can't believe this happened," Roy said quietly. "We're gonna lose our jobs … over five hundred lousy dollars that we never took from that victim!"

The police had questioned them both for hours. It seemed whenever they came back from a run, the detectives were there like some rabid version of Columbo from TV. _Just one more question… _

Roy's head rested on the table, pictures of his two kids smiling up from his worn wallet. Things were looking bad. Neither he nor John were sleeping at night, looking over their shoulders whenever they went out on a run, jumping every time their doorbells rang waiting to be arrested.

Chet's tuna surprise swam around in five cups of black coffee in John's stomach. He wouldn't have eaten it at all if Roy hadn't insisted he needed his strength for work. Looking at Chris and Jenny in the photos and his partner so worried about their future, John wondered if he and Roy would have even been accused in the first place if it weren't for his heritage.

John left the room without a word making it to the bathroom just in time to lose the contents of his stomach. Straightening himself up and washing his mouth out with Listerine he stared at himself in the mirror, grateful that no one had been about to see his weakness. He took a few deep breaths and slapped both sides of his face to put some color back and made his way to the bay.

"Um, Cap, can I use your office for a minute?"

"Sure, John, you okay? Well, you know, as good as you can be under the circumstances," Cap asked kindly.

"Yeah, sure Cap," John said, smiling but Cap noticed it didn't reach his eyes. Cap went in search of his other paramedic to see how he was holding up.

XXXX

"Roy? How you doing, pal?"

Roy lifted his head from the table.

"Better than John, I think," Roy yawned.

"We'll talk about your partner in a minute. I asked how you were doing," Cap pushed.

Roy banged his head softly on the table which answered Cap's question.

"I dunno, Cap. I guess I just never considered something like this would happen. I mean, this subject never came up in training. And you should have seen the officers they sent over; ruthless, particularly when it came to Johnny's whereabouts when we were in that guy's apartment. You know, part of me wants to be mad at the victim. I know it's not fair but really, what's a guy doin' with five hundred bucks in his wallet in his own home? You know, it's not like we ask victims to fall on their knees and thank us for basically bringing them back to life, I don't have a God complex or anything but it would be nice if the first thing they did when they awoke wasn't to accuse us of taking their money."

"I'm sorry, Roy. I know the officers were brutal. I'm gonna talk to John when he gets off the phone. How's Jo taking all this?"

Roy looked up at Cap gratefully. The man had everything covered. He cared about the immediate family and the extended families of fifty-one.

"She's been a rock, Cap. She had it all calculated in terms of how many years she'd have to go back to work to pay back the kid's college fund if we ended up needing to pay some serious lawyer fees. You should have heard her yell at John when he was checking the want adds for a second job. I have no idea what we'd do if we weren't getting legal representation for free."

"Jo is a strong woman," Cap laughed, recalling the story of how she'd approached Dr. Brackett fearlessly when he opposed the implementation of a paramedic program.

"Besides, Mike, Marco and I already planned to take up a collection to help you guys out if you end up … you know … in jail," Chet said eavesdropping without shame in the doorway.

"Thanks, Chet," Roy said sincerely. "And thanks for keeping the phantom on a leash for the last few days."

"Yeah, well, if I thought it would cheer the kid up I'd let him free in a minute," Chet said sadly. "He's really scared about going to jail."

"Of course he is," Marco said and there was bitterness in his voice that his friends rarely heard. "I heard that one officer saying something about John being native and wondering if he took the money without your knowledge, Roy."

Marco muttered something in Spanish and shook his head darkly in total understanding of the young paramedic's plight as a minority.

"He did what!" Roy shouted, standing up suddenly. "I'm going to call that cop and give him a piece of my mind! He can't do that!"

Cap put his hand on Roy's shoulder as Mike came in to do the same thing. Seems they'd all been hanging out listening to the conversation in the kitchen.

"John's on the phone in Cap's office, Roy. You need to calm down. You can't change people's prejudice, you know that. If you call that cop it's just going to get his feathers ruffled and distract him from looking for the real thief. He said what he did off the record and if we call him on it we'll have a tough time proving anything," the engineer said looking mutinous himself.

"This guy's making our life a living hell. Every time we get back from a call, he's here, asking the same questions over and over again. I can't take it anymore. I'm tired … and Cap … I don't wanna go to jail. And I can't stand watching them questioning John the way they do. They wanted to take John alone and question him but the battalion chief advised him against going along with them. You know … that last time they wanted to question him alone, I swear I saw all the fight leave him and I think that scared me more than anything.

XXXX

John sat at Cap's desk, tilted on two caster wheels backwards on the old wooden chair. He dialed Roy's phone number three times and hung up each time Joanne answered but the fourth time a whistle trilled loudly into the receiver.

"Gah!" The over-caffeinated paramedic shot backwards, the chair leg catching on a heavy floor mat and toppling him and it headlong. The back of his head smacked off the concrete floor.

"Urgh!" John smacked the mat in frustration. "Yeah, can't land on that, right? Nope, right into the damned floor," he cussed as he blinked in pain.

"Johnny? Is that you? Is something wrong with the phone? Are you alright? Is Roy alright? Answer me!"

Johnny took a deep breath and collected himself. "Jo. Yeah, it's me," he panted out as he reached up to find a lump forming on the back of his head.

"What's going on? Why did you keep hanging up? I thought it was a prank call so I got the whistle. Sorry if I hurt your ears."

"Nah, it's nuthin'. M'okay, honest, and so is Roy. Everything's fine … other than the obvious," John answered.

"Did you see the lawyer?" Joanne asked anxiously.

"Y-yeah, we saw 'im," John confirmed, finally clearing his vision a bit as he pinched the bridge of his nose against the pain in his head. "He said it's unlikely anyone will want to take the whole thing to trial, that we shouldn't plea bargain but that we'd likely be arrested soon and for us to call him when that happens. So far, Roy's probably told you HQ are only interested observers but as soon as we're arrested, we're suspended and you know how long a trial takes, not to mention bail costs; guilty until proven innocent you know … anyway, Jo, listen please and don't say anything."

"You're scaring me, John. Where's Roy?"

"He's in the kitchen. He's okay, Jo, I promise and he's going to keep being okay and so are you and the kids. God, Jo, Roy's my best friend, you and the kids, you've taken me in when I'm hurt and … you're just incredible…"

Something broke in Joanne. She knew what was coming somehow from that one word. John said it all the time, 'this chick's incredible, that fire was incredible, that rescue was incredible'.

"I'm gonna confess, Jo. There's no other way. No matter what we're both gonna get arrested any time now. Roy's a good guy. He doesn't deserve this. I want you to know though, I didn't take that money. I didn't okay? But they'll expect it … This life wasn't meant for me. I dunno why I ever thought I could have it. There's just no sense in both of us losing our jobs over this."

"No, don't you do it John Gage. Roy's never going to let this happen, you know that."

"That's why I'm doing this, Jo," John said, his voice cracking despite his best efforts. "You should have seen him at the interrogation. He said _we_, Jo. He said – he said _we_ didn't take the money, not _I._ He spoke for me. And now I'm gonna do something for him."

"Johnny listen to me, don't do this!" Joanne pleaded. "Get Roy and put him on the phone. We'll get through this together okay?"

At that moment the tones sounded.

"Please, Jo, don't tell Roy. He'll try to save me and we'll both end up in the same place anyway. Let me go."

John hung up, wiped his eyes and ran to the squad. Roy already had the engine running as he accepted a call slip and sped off with the engine. John fought his stomach and the pain in his head. It would be good to get in one more rescue, store another memory of the job he loved so much.

Police cars lined the street as they approached the intersection where two cars were stuck bumper to bumper, a fire hydrant between them spewing water over drenched onlookers. A third car was bisected by an electrical pole whose wires hung like sparking garlands around it. A man approached the vehicle.

"NO!" John shouted, leaping from the passenger side of the squad before it came to a full stop. "Stay back, you'll get electrocuted."

The man stopped in his tracks pointing out needlessly that the person in the car needed help.

"I've already contacted the city to shut down the lines," Vince Howard told Cap who was picking up the microphone on Big Red. Chet and Marco stood ready for the all clear. Mike dug out the cutting tools.

Steam billowed into the air from broken radiators. John jumped as Officer Vince Howard approached. He'd always felt at ease with Vince before but since Vince's barb about a victim's wallet from an earlier rescue, even the familiar officer made him want to bolt like a guilty man.

John shivered as the fountain of cold water from the busted hydrant enveloped him as he took off his turnout coat to lean across the jagged metal of the bisected car to check the lone victim. His helmet wouldn't fit inside. He took it off. He knew as soon as his eyes adjusted to the shadowed interior and water continued to pound down his face causing him to blink heavily to see, that there was nothing he could do for the young man behind the wheel. For a second he wanted nothing but to call Roy over, to give this one away but he steeled himself and took his glove off to place two fingers on the man's bloodied neck. It wasn't a surprise that there was no carotid pulse but the deathly cold skin still rattled him and he stood up too quickly, hitting his already hurting head on the jagged metal roof.

Cap turned only in time to see his youngest paramedic punch the battered metal showering pooled water on the roof up into his face.

John tilted his head back and let the still spewing hydrant water flow into his mouth to rinse the bile that rose in his throat. A hand landed on his shoulder causing him to flinch. Cap bent to look into the car and pulled back sadly. John just nodded in the negative to Cap who called in a code R with obvious injuries that were incompatible with life and went to help Roy. Roy opened his mouth to ask about the victim when John shut him down with a sad nod.

Roy took the news of the Code R hard as he worked to free a whiplash victim. John noticed the deliberate movements of Roy's hands as though he had to concentrate extra hard to perform tasks he could normally do in his sleep. Together with Chet and Marco's help they packaged the two remaining non-critical victims for transport.

"I'll uh, ride with the v-victims," John offered way too fast for Roy's liking. Usually John jumped at the chance to drive the squad. Roy shrugged it off figuring his friend was just tired and stressed over their imminent arrest. No one had been arrested in the case of the missing money and he and John remained the only suspects and time was running out.

John shivered and poured water from his boots before getting into the ambulance as Roy put the squad in gear ready to follow. John got into the ambulance with more effort than usual.

"You really need to get some sleep, Junior," the senior paramedic muttered sadly toward the disappearing ambulance

Roy was glad for the shower of icy water from the hydrant. The ambulance's lights were mesmerizing to his tired eyes as he sat up straight trying not to follow too closely, the sirens giving him a headache and singing a weird song only he could hear; guil-ty – guil-ty!

XXXX

Joanne frantically dialed the number of Station fifty-one twenty times. She'd tried to call the lawyer her husband and John had spoken to but his office was closed. She wasn't going to let John ruin his life admitting to a crime he had not committed. Her hand rested on the dial of the phone hoping she could talk John out of confessing before he got a chance to actually do it.

XXXX

John kept his head down. The lights in treatment two were too bright as he rattled off his last vitals on their whiplash victim to Dr. Brackett.

"You okay, John?" Brackett asked.

"Oh, yeah, sure Doc. Fine. Hey listen, you need me for anything?"

"Nope, I think you're free to go," Brackett said, turning his attention to his patient.

"For now …" John whispered, taking his leave.

John's eyes widened as his boots squeaked into the hall. Roy was there. The police were coming down the hallway toward them. This was it. He wouldn't get a chance to say goodbye to his best friend. Roy wouldn't be friends with a thief, someone who would steal from a downed man.

John steeled himself and opened his mouth as the officer's hand jutted out. John clasped his hands together and put them out in a show of surrender and to stop them from shaking as he took a deep breath. The pain in his head pulsed in time to his speeding heart.

"Good news fellas," the officer greeted, shaking Roy's hand enthusiastically and taking John's to do the same thing. "You're out of the frying pan."

"And into the fire?" Johnny asked staring at his still un-cuffed hands as the officer let go of him. Everything was a blur as the officer explained that a woman who lived in the building with the theft victim had in fact taken the money to satisfy a gambling problem.

The cops were halfway down the hall when Roy's voice got through to him.

"Earth to Johnny. Hey man, you okay? Didn't you hear them? We're okay. They know we didn't do it. I have to call Jo."

_Jo! Oh my God,_ John thought desperately as he raced Roy to the bank of payphones at the far end of the hall. John pushed a tray of food into Roy's path, which stopped him in his tracks to apologize to the surprised candy striper.

"I have to call Jo!" John called loudly. The numbers on the phone were fuzzy and his fingers felt too big but he managed to dial, leaning heavily on the wall for support.

The phone was picked up on the first ring. John's face contorted in pain as Jo screamed from the receiver.

"John Gage if you ever do anything so stupid as confess to …" Jo ranted without even asking who was on the phone.

"P - please don't shout, Jo. My head hu – I mean, um, I didn't have to do it," John whispered. "Please, please don't tell Roy I was gonna do it. I don't think I could take him being mad at me."

"How do you think he'd have felt if you'd done it? Wait a minute, what do you mean you didn't have to do it, does that mean you guys have been cleared?"

"We're cleared," John yelled into the phone, happiness masking his exhaustion as his headache ramped up to near intolerable levels.

"I won't tell him, but don't you ever … ever do anything like that again," Joanne warned, changing her tone to match John's celebratory one when Roy took the phone from him.

"Oh Junior, Dixie says we never run in a hospital and she told me to tell you to get your skinny butt up the hall and help clean up the spilled Jell-O and the water we got all over the floor," Roy told his partner his tone light, entirely too relieved to be irritated.

"And by the way, why did you need to talk to my wife?" Roy asked.

John opened his mouth but didn't trust himself to speak. His head was swimming and nausea was pressing in on him body and mind. He smiled as convincingly as he could and let Roy have his moment with his wife. All the fight or flight adrenaline that had been keeping him going for the past week was utterly spent and the relief today brought felt fleeting and temporary.

XXXX

Dixie smiled as John trudged up the hall. She didn't approve of running in _her_ hallways but she couldn't be mad at the young paramedic for long. John grabbed a towel and bent to clean up the green Jell=O. She couldn't believe the usually fiery paramedic hadn't asked her to call an orderly to pick up the green, gelatinous muck. As she came around the desk to relieve the way too compliant paramedic from the task, he dropped the towel suddenly, his face turning the exact color of the muck he was cleaning up.

Roy was just hanging up the phone looking immensely better than he had in days. Dix knelt beside John and signaled him to come. Roy's eyes widened in surprise seeing his almost prone partner and he broke the no running in the halls rule.

"Johnny, what is it?" Roy asked anxiously. His wife had cryptically told him to watch his partner for the rest of the shift.

"M'fine. Jus - just give me a minute, 'k?"

"Man, you were really worried," Roy said sympathetically. "Here, let me help you up. A good meal and some down time'll put you right as rain."

John took the proffered appendage and stood up on shaky legs. Not a good idea. The world spun, the last few days jumbling in his brain. He grabbed the back of his soaked head honestly fearing that the lump back there was going to burst open and everyone would be able to see what he'd been thinking, what he'd been fearing, what he'd been about to do.

Roy tried prying John's fingers from his head as Dixie flagged down an orderly with a wheelchair to take John to treatment three.

"When did you plan to tell me about this?" Roy asked sternly probing the huge goose egg on the back of his partner's head as he racked his brain trying to remember John getting hurt at the scene of the accident.

Johns' resolve crumbled as he mistook what Roy meant.

"I couldn't let them take you to jail," John whispered.

"What?" Roy asked as John's voice weakened further. "What do you mean?"

"I t – told you, they expected this. It was a fluke. It had to end, you know?"

"No, Junior, I don't know; tell me," Roy pleaded, getting very worried when he got his first good look at his partner's huge pupils.

Dr. Early answered the page to treatment three and he and Roy helped John up onto the gurney but the agitated young man wouldn't lie down when told to do so. He batted Joe's hands away as the penlight stabbed into his retinas. Confused thoughts ran through his head like they were being thrown at him by a pitching machine; fear, shame, guilt, relief.

Dr. Early reached up toward John's head but Roy beat him to it. Early knew something was going on between the two men so he set to work getting a pulse and other vitals instead. Dr. Early fit an oxygen mask over his patient's face.

"Ouch," John let slip between clenched teeth.

"How many fingers?" Dr. Early asked, wiggling two digits in the air from halfway across the room. John answered correctly but Early didn't like the way he had to squint to focus.

"I'm going to order some X-rays, John, why don't you get out of those wet clothes and sit tight. I'll be right back," Early told him.

Roy waited until the door closed after Joe. He knew he had minutes until Dixie would be in. John seemed to sense the same thing.

"Urgh, don' – want Dix ta hafta …" he made scissors with his clumsy fingers. "Cut 'm off," he said sluggishly tugging at his pants.

"Here, let me," Roy said tiredly.

John slapped Roy's hands away. Roy put his own up in surrender but stepped right back in when John admitted defeat to the stupid buttons which were obviously too large for the really small holes he'd somehow miraculously managed to button up himself only this morning.

"How'd you hit your head?" Roy asked, trying really hard not to launch into a lecture about how dangerous not telling him had been.

"When I called Jo …" he trailed off, clamping his hand over his betraying blabber mouth.

Roy's brow creased in concentration.

"No you didn't," he said. "Try again, maybe this time you'll come up with something I'll believe."

"I don't know … at the accident, on the car. Guess I just never felt it with the cold water an' all." _True_, John thought triumphantly. Roy didn't need to know that he'd probably been walking around concussed for an hour.

Roy draped a warm blanket over his partner to save his modesty and stop the shivers wracking the thin body. "Socks," Roy said firmly, taking John's sopping foot into his hands.

The blue sock peeled off leaving patterns on the skin from the shrunken wet cotton. A star shaped scar graced Gage's left ankle. Roy stared at it for a minute, the feeling of déjà vu hitting him in waves, but then why shouldn't it; he'd helped his wounded partner out of his clothes many times.

"Le-go of my foot," John slurred. If you hold my-my leg up like that, Dix's gonna get an eyeful of sumthin' she does not need to see." John pulled his foot out of Roy's grasp and tucked the blanket around his thighs and midsection tighter but Roy's eyes followed the ankle, staring at the star shaped scar.

"M' up here," John giggled stupidly, using a line that nurses often used on him when he was staring at something he shouldn't.

Roy smiled and made to cuff him lightly on the shoulder but thought better of it. His partner looked like he'd fall over in a slight wind but still refused to lie down.

"Look, why don't you lie down? I promise I won't let you fall asleep."

"Not lying down. Don't care if I fall asleep," John muttered. "This – this whole week's been … really hard. I dunno if I can take it anymore."

"It's over, remember, partner?" Roy reminded his friend, wondering where Doc was with the X-ray machine.

"Never over, Roy, don't you get that!" John wheezed slightly, ripping the oxygen mask off.

Roy's eyes widened as he tried to calm his friend. He knew concussion victims often acted irrationally but his partner was on one hell of a roller coaster. Roy made a mental note to tell Early how much caffeine his partner had had and how little food and sleep as well.

Roy gently replaced the oxygen mask. John grasped it and inhaled deeply and his eyes closed.

"No, Junior, you can't sleep yet," Roy said gently, his concern ramping up a notch.

"I'm so tired, Roy. I try so hard. No one believes me … They always said I'd be no good…"

Roy scrubbed his hand over his face, steadying his partner with the other. Now he at least thought he knew what all of this was about. Hell, John had been hinting at it all week but he'd been so wrapped up in his own worries over Jo and the kids and he just hadn't thought about it.

"This is about Chet's teasing you about your heritage again, isn't it?" Roy asked gently. "He stopped that awhile ago when he said that book he'd bought was a bunch of …" Roy looked around to make sure Dixie wasn't on her way in, "bullshit."

"It-it doesn't matter if it's bullshit, Roy! This is gonna just keep happening. Every time something goes missing they're gonna – they're gonna look at me, the little savage who belongs back on the reservation being the loser they always said I'd be. I tried so hard … When I was a kid I thought I could make it all go away by stealing…" John's eyes grew wide and he realized the irony of what he'd been trying to tell his best friend, that he wasn't a thief but … he was a thief.

"Look, I – I've really loved being your partner. You and Jo, you've done so much for me. I have those m-memories but Roy, I think I'm quitting. I can't stand the eyes … the eyes, you know? That cop looked at me like I was a bug he'd like to step on. I can't do that to you again."

"What are you talking about, Junior?" Roy said, tiredness prickling the corners of his eyes as he replaced the oxygen mask yet again. He suddenly felt very old, the week's ordeal catching up to him.

"They even call – at the station – like they're waitin' on me to fail so they can say – I told you s-so. Don't you remember that woman who called awhile back wanting to talk to the _one that got away?"_

Dr. Early chose that moment with everything dangling in the air including John's nervously swinging leg. Roy caught another glance at the star shaped scar on his ankle before being asked to leave the room so the X-ray tech could get a skull series.

"Hope you have someone down in the lab who can translate nut, and Junior, we're not done here," Roy said fondly as he patted John on the shoulder rather harder than he'd intended.

Normally Roy calling him a nut set John off a tangent but today, the word settled in his mind as he tried to take a mental snapshot of what it sounded like. He allowed Malcolm to lie him down and position him on the table.

Roy paced the hall when a familiar figure strode up to him.

"Jo, what are you doing here?" Roy allowed himself to sink to her height, enveloped in her arms.

"I called the station to tell the guys the good news and Captain Stanley told me you were here with Johnny … as a code I. I just talked to him, he didn't sound so good but I thought that was because of all the stress. What's happened to him?"

"Concussion," Roy told her.

"I knew it," she said softly. "When he dropped the phone and I heard him yell, I knew something happened. I should have told you."

"What!" Roy shouted to the door as though John would hear him. "He told me he hit his head on a car at the accident we just attended to."

"Well, I mean I'm not sure … I was just guessing here," Jo told her husband.

"Yeah, you know you're probably right. I just didn't notice he was hurt because I was too busy feeling sorry for myself."

"Oh brother! You guys have to get it together; him blaming himself, you blaming yourself, this has to stop."

"I know. And John thinks he knows how to stop it. He's quitting."

"Oh hell no!" Jo shouted a little louder than was strictly hospital whisper quiet.

The minute Malcolm wheeled the huge X-ray machine from John's room Jo stormed into the room, her purse swinging over her shoulder madly. Her prey was already sitting up though she'd caught the last of Malcolm's warning to remain still.

John leveled his eyes on Joanne as clearly as he could.

"Jo, please? Don't. I want things to be good between us and I – I'm leaving the department so there's no reason to bother tell…"

"Not this time, Johnny, I'm sorry," she told the shivering paramedic whose eyes continued to plead for secrecy he wasn't going to get.

"John here was going to confess to taking that money to save you from going to jail … to save us from losing you," Jo said quietly.

Roy stumbled back a bit. He counted to ten. It wasn't a good idea to yell at a concussed person.

"Didn't you hear me when I told you that WE weren't going to plea bargain because WE didn't do it? How do you think I would have felt if you'd gone and done that?"

"Free," John sassed back. "Lis-listen, can we do this later? I don-don't feel so good."

"John? Hey, Johnny, stay with me, pal, 'k?" Roy got behind John while Joanne patted John's cheeks and tried to keep him talking.

"M'not a savage. M'not a thief," John moaned.

"I know that. I believe you," Roy tried.

"I know," John said hopelessly. Now Roy wondered what he'd just told John he believed. "You always believed me. But see, I never knew that until you took my sock off."

"Dr. Early!" Roy yelled. His friend was making no sense. And where was Dixie?

Early and Dixie rushed into the room at Roy's shouts. John was impossibly pale and swaying slightly in Roy's grip.

"Okay, follow my penlight, John."

John tried to follow the penlight, left, right but when he tried to follow it upwards, his eyes rolled back in his head and he slumped backwards into Roy who was still checking the back of his head. Roy stumbled and tripped taking both of them to the floor.

"OOF!" The air whooshed from Roy's lungs but he clung protectively to his partner whose head lolled on his chest. Both of them stared up into the concerned face of Dr. Early who told Dixie to call for some orderlies.

Dr. Early knelt down, his necktie dangling in both men's faces. It was a gaudy tie really Roy and John both smiled staring at it in an unfocused sort of way which caused the white haired doctor even more concern. The doctor wondered what could be so funny about an otter swimming through the water on a pale blue tie he'd just purchased from the Museum of Natural History's gift shop to fund marshland preservation.

"Trusting, inquisitive …" Roy whispered when his air came back.

"Bright, loyal friendship," John giggled in a rather insane way causing the doctor even more concern at the babbling banter between the two normally very sane men … well at least one of them was normally quite sane.

Two orderlies gently pried Johnny from Roy and placed him on the gurney where Dixie promptly strapped him down.

"Anything broken, Roy?" Early asked the senior paramedic.

"No … just my mind," Roy said, accepting a hand up from an orderly.

Roy waited until Dr. Early checked John for further injury. Satisfied that he'd sustained no further injury he turned to Roy.

"That was some catch," Early commented.

"He's had practice," Joanne said, awestruck.

"How is this even possible?" Roy said, rubbing his chest slightly.

"I t – told you, they sent me a friend," John smiled and promptly passed out.

"And it's okay now," Roy finished, placing his hand on John's chest. "They obviously sent me a friend too that day, but if you ever – ever! Try to throw yourself under the bus for me again, I'll … I'll, I guess I'll just catch you like you were going to do for me."

XXXX

Dr. Brackett and Dr. Early pored over John's skull X-rays. Roy smiled, knowing it was overkill but heartened that John was so well cared for.

Dixie prepared an IV on Dr. Early's orders.

"He doesn't like 'em in his right arm," Roy said tiredly standing over his partner protectively.

"I know," Dix smiled indulgently. Normally she would have rolled her eyes at this pronouncement. John had been her patient many times. Roy flinched when the needle was inserted but his partner remained still.

"He's gonna feel a lot better once he's re-hydrated, Roy. You said yourself he's only really had coffee for the last few days. Once his BP comes up a bit he's going to be sending us all out for ice cream."

"I know, but he hates IV's."

Dr. Early put his hand on Roy's shoulder. "Well, there's no intracranial bleeding, our boy's got a bad concussion though. I have no idea how he hid this one, I'm just glad he didn't go back to the station and go to bed."

"I don't think that would'a happened. Cap was waiting to talk to him; I think he knew John was getting to point of no return. I think Cap was getting close to sending us both home to tell you the truth. I just don't know how I missed it."

"You'd have noticed something off if you'd had a minute alone without blaring sirens, victims to attend to and cops breathing down your necks, Roy. Don't beat yourself up. Speaking of which, how much sleep and proper nutrition have you gotten this week?"

"Me, doc? Oh come on now, I'm fine," Roy stated flatly putting his hands up defensively.

"M'hm," Brackett said skeptically taking in Roy's haggard appearance.

"I'm putting you on medical leave for a few days. You're headed for exhaustion like our friend here. Seems we've all missed a lot over the past few days," Early stated.

"I shouldn't have called Johnny over-sensitive about sending Vince in with that intern's wallet," Dix lamented, handing Roy a pair of scrubs and shooing him toward the curtains.

"You couldn't have known what was going on, Dix, don't you start beating yourself up too," Brackett said, putting his arm around the nurse's shoulder in a very uncharacteristic show of public affection.

Roy was glad for the privacy of the curtain. He peeled the wet clothes off. The scrubs were warm and dry making him instantly more keenly aware of the exhaustion he'd been overcompensating for all week.

Roy stepped from behind the curtain. Joanne was back from making a phone call to their babysitter. She took the wet clothes from her husband.

"Looks like you'll have me around for a few days," he said cryptically.

Joanne looked suddenly worried.

"Oh – oh no, I'm fine, Jo, just Dr. Early feels I need a few days off."

"I'll go inform Captain Stanley," Dr. Early offered while Dr. Brackett answered a page and Dixie arranged for John to be transferred upstairs for hourly observation.

When Dixie hung up the phone, Joanne drew her aside while Roy spoke quietly to his passed out partner.

There would conveniently be two beds waiting upstairs, you know, in case an exhausted visitor needed to lie down.

"Thanks, Dix," Jo said warmly knowing there was no way her husband would leave his partner alone tonight.

XXXX

John groaned as he opened his eyes.

"Neuro check," Roy said tiredly but happy.

"Nah, lemme sleep," John grumped into his pillow, glad that the oxygen mask was replaced by a nasal canula sometime since the last neuro check.

But the questions from this particular neuro check were unlike any he'd heard before.

"How old were you when we met?"

John's huge pupils stared up in surprise as Dix stood over Roy's shoulder taking notes in his charts.

So it hadn't been a dream?

"S-seven?"

"Right!"

John didn't think there were points or prizes for passing a neuro check but he was wrong.

Joanne stepped up and looked at the groggy young man in the bed who had been prepared to basically give his life to save them from a life apart … for the second time.

Roy pressed a button to allow his aching friend to sit up a bit as Joanne handed them both small, blue boxes. She opened John's and handed him a bit of cloth the same as Roy held in his hand from his own box. Ties, identical to the one Dr. Early had been wearing the day before.

"Jo … you-you're incredible!" John smiled.

"I know," she blushed, you told me that already … remember?" She handed John a paper that Roy hadn't seen since he was fourteen years old, the very faded RD loves JP still indented on the paper though the lead had long since been erased.

"You are a thief!" Roy laughed.

"Told ya," John grinned back.

"So … we good? You're not quitting?"

"Nah, we changed Chet, what's a bazillion other people? Besides, you've seen my feet naked, in some cultures that makes us pretty-well married, sorry Jo," John yawned.

Joanne looked at her husband as he turned around for a minute seemingly plucking a huge splinter from his eye before turning back around, the irritation from that particular splinter making itself evident in the watery tracks on his careworn face.

"Um, Roy, can you call Aunt Rose for me? You know the drill … start with, _he's fine, don't worry. _Tomorrow's Sunday and if I don't show up for dinner at her place she'll call … the fire department," John giggled.

"Get some rest, Junior," Roy whispered as his partner's dark lashes folded together in sleep. "And if your aunt knew what you were going to do … don't worry I won't tell her. But you really are a nut."

Roy slipped his tie loosely over his head staring at the totem otter. It looked right somehow, even paired with a fresh set of scrubs. Jo kissed him on the forehead.

"See you at home soon," she whispered, knowing he couldn't leave just yet and feeling that this whole situation was _incredible_.

Roy sat down beside John's bed and closed his eyes, remembering the small boy he'd held in his arms all those years ago and the jumble of words swirling on paper as they flushed away. In his hand he held the paper upon which he'd declared his love for Joanne, the initials refusing to disappear even after all these years. Trust his partner to be the one who would prove that the pen is only mightier than the sword when it's wielded by a worthy man.


End file.
